Lovers and Liars

by Brenda Joyce

Belinda clenched her fists as he strode to the tape deck and inserted the cassette. She regathered her composure, but that icy tentacle of dread was back, clutching at her vitals.

  “I tape every minute of every day in my office,” Abe said, “and I want you to hear this conversation.” As he rewound the tape, he glanced at her. “Better sit down.”

  Of course she stood. Then she heard Abe’s voice, on the tape:

  What do you want? You’ve got about two minutes before security comes and throws you out.

  I want [pause] congratulations.

  Belinda tensed. It was Jack, and there was something in his tone that was unfamiliar and frightening and momentarily undefinable.

  Her father’s rude laugh sounded, and he was saying:

  For what? Shortest career in history?

  For my marriage. To your daughter.

  Laughter followed, and it was malicious. Belinda’s dread grew.

  What?

  [Laughter] How do you feel about having a grandson with the last name of Ford? Because you can bet we’ve been working on it.

  You little cocksucker! I don’t know how you did it, but I’ll undo it!—before you can even blink!

  “What’s wrong, Glassman? Or should I call you Abe? No, wait—Dad?

  You have a lot of balls, to dare to use my daughter to get at me.

  It was a stroke of genius, wasn’t it? I knew there had to be some way I could avenge myself. Appropriate, wouldn’t you say?

  You think you can win? Beat me? You think I’ll stand for this? You stupid bastard! I don’t know how you did it, but your marriage is over before it even began—I guarantee that.

  How does it feel? How does it feel to have your enemy as a son-in-law? Huh? How does it feel, you fucking bastard? And I’ll never agree to a divorce—never. You’re stuck with me until the day you die.

  We’ll see! How could Belinda be such a fool, to let herself be conned by you?

  Does it really matter? And if you think you’re going to have your thugs work me over again, think twice. My lawyer still has that letter telling everything—only now it’s been updated. If I go, I’m taking you with me—old man.

  Get out! Get out while you can. But if you think I’ll give Belinda a single penny while she’s married to you, you’re wrong. She gets nothing! Nothing! If she has your son—he gets nothing! Not one fucking penny!

  How does it feel to lose?

  Abe turned off the tape.

  Belinda was sitting. She was so numb she couldn’t think, didn’t want to, couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe.

  Abe said, “Jack Ford has been my enemy for seventeen years, and he’s using you to shaft me—in case the tape wasn’t clear.”

  His words brought back her ability to think.

  Enemy for seventeen years …

  Using me …

  Lies. Their love, all lies. She lifted a white face toward her father. “Get out!” she gasped. “Get out, you bastard, before I—” She choked, looking quickly away. She had never hated her father more.

  Oh, Jack! Tell me it’s not true! No!

  “Don’t worry,” Abe said. “We won’t let that little prick get away with this. I’ll call you tomorrow after I talk with my lawyers.”

  She couldn’t answer—her hold on her self-control was too precarious. She heard him leaving. The front door slammed. She hugged herself hard, shivering.

  It was a stroke of genius, I knew there had to be a way to avenge myself. Appropriate, wouldn’t you say?

  How does it feel to lose?

  I’II never agree to a divorce, never. You’re stuck with me.

  How do you feel about having a grandson with the last name of Ford?

  Belinda got up and ran to the bathroom, but her heaves were dry. She knelt there at the cold porcelain bowl for a long time. He didn’t know she was pregnant, of course, but now everything was clear, so clear. The echoes wouldn’t go away.

  It was a stroke of genius …

  Avenge myself …

  Appropriate …

  Stroke of genius …

  116

  There was no sweet, sweet feeling of triumph. Just a cold, panicky fear. And the sickness.

  Jack swung the Ferrari around a curve. He felt the awful weight of his guilt, and that made him angry. Angrier. He had been pushed too far.

  He knew Glassman would make a move now. His guts cramped at the thought. Glassman would try to get at Belinda, try to turn her against him. Maybe even bully her. He could handle it. He knew he could. Belinda already loved him.

  If worse came to worst, he would have to come clean, explain it all. His hands grew white on the steering wheel.

  He had to get to her now.

  Before Glassman.

  Before she found out the truth—and the deceit.

  She met him at the door, looking ill.

  “Are you all right?” he asked, reaching out.

  She struck his hand away. “Don’t touch me.”

  He froze. She knew. “What’s wrong?”

  “ ‘It was a stroke of genius,’ ”; she said, and he felt something sick and cold plunge into his guts. “ ‘I knew there had to be some way to avenge myself. Appropriate, wouldn’t you say?’ ”

  He stared, horrified at hearing his own cruel words coming from her lips.

  Her voice broke. “ ‘How does it feel to lose?’ ”

  “Belinda …” he said, feeling desperation uncoiling within him.

  She whirled away. She pointed to the stereo system, confusing him. “It’s all on tape—every word.” She turned to him, her eyes huge and brown in her white, pinched face. “Deny it,” she begged.

  For just a moment Jack closed his eyes. Dear God, no. Not this. Those words had been meant for Glassman, not for Belinda. Never for Belinda.

  “You can’t deny it, can you?” she whispered.

  His face was agonized and seeking. “Belinda, it’s not the way it sounds.”

  “Just deny it, damn you!” she shouted. “Deny that you married me to get at my father! Deny it!”

  He inhaled. “I can’t lie to you anymore. I can’t deny it.”

  “All lies!” she said brokenly. Tears swam in her eyes. “All lies—every minute with you has been a lie!”

  “No!” he said hoarsely. “No, it’s not all lies!”

  She looked at him, so stricken with despair, hurt, agony, and hope that he hated himself.

  “How much I want you isn’t a lie. That’s real. You know it’s real.”

  “Oh, good!” she shrilled. “You want to fuck me! Well, buddy, welcome to the crowd and get to the end of the line!”

  “Don’t make it sound like that,” he said. “Belinda, I love you.”

  “How dare you!” she screamed. “Well, I hate you. Get out! Get out and don’t ever come back!”

  He felt something twist inside, like a knife. He went to her, placing his hands on the smooth curves of her shoulders, but she turned away with a cry.

  “I didn’t want to hurt you,” he said hoarsely to her back, and God knew, it was true. “Belinda, listen to me—I didn’t want to hurt you.”

  She laughed hysterically. “My consolation prize.”

  “Let’s talk this through, please!”

  “There’s nothing more to talk about.” She turned, lifting a white face and glazed eyes. “Except a divorce.”

  He was stunned. It took a moment to recover. “I don’t want a divorce.”

  “Oh, right! Because of Abe—you’ll never give me a divorce! Well, you just listen good, Jack. You’ve got another think coming if you think I’m going to stay married to a lower-class piece of ass like yourself. Like I said once before—pricks are a dime a dozen. And I am my father’s daughter—or have you suddenly forgotten? How does it feel, Jack, to have another Glassman after your ass?”

  At first Jack didn’t answer. Her eyes were blazing with fury. And possibly with hate. “I thought you loved me. If you loved me, you’d give me another chance and you’d forgi
ve me.”

  Belinda laughed. “You’ve got to be kidding! Love, Jack? It was just the hots—like I said, you are prime meat. Surely you’ve made that mistake too?”

  His jaw tightened. “Don’t push me away.”

  “Nancy was right,” Belinda cried. “You’re nothing but a liar, a user, and a loser. One big fat loser. Get out, Jack. You’re really pressing your luck.”

  “You are just like your old man, aren’t you?” He turned stiffly on his heel. He was at the door, his hand on the knob, when she spat out, “I’ll never forgive you.”

  “Lady,” he snarled, “I just changed my mind. I couldn’t care less.”

  “Never.”

  117

  He couldn’t stop remembering.

  But did he even want to?

  Her smile after the first time she told him she loved him, so shy and tremulous, like a child’s smile, and how he himself had responded … Funny, warm, gargantuan feelings had welled up inside him like a balloon. And he had grabbed her to him and they had rolled over and over and then they had made love …

  Her laughter when the kite had flown into the tree, and his fear, his own heart in his throat choking him as she climbed after it—practically to the top—while he stood below resolved to catch her if she fell, cursing himself for letting her go after the stupid toy, her every movement terrifying him …

  How she had looked doing the dishes, how they fought over politics and metaphysics with no end in sight—she believed in past lives, no matter how he tried to explain it was impossible—and how she had finally gotten furious and thrown the wet dishrag in his face and called him a triple Taurus with a dose of Capricorn thrown in. He hadn’t understood that insult, but he knew it was bad. He hadn’t asked her just what it meant, not until much later, after they had made up with much enthusiasm.

  He was not a triple Taurus—because one of his signs was Gemini. She had groaned at that bit of information.

  “I’ll bet the other is Leo.” She moaned in dismay.

  “What’s wrong with being a Gemini?” he asked.

  “I have a fatal attraction to Geminis, and they’re all two-faced playboys.”

  “How do you feel about a reformed two-faced playboy?” he asked, copping a feel. She had giggled. End of argument.

  She had cried forever over that movie, and he had been amazed, holding her and comforting her until soft touching had turned into frantic affirmations of love. “I don’t ever want to lose you,” she had whispered, holding him, stroking him urgently, pulling him down, and he had felt the urgency too, the need to meld and join and dominate and soar.

  Maybe it was then that he had fallen in love with her.

  He wished he had never used her to get at Glassman. If he could, he would take it all back. And now he had gotten a call from Glassman himself.

  “Where the fuck is she?” Glassman had demanded.

  “I assume at home—I haven’t seen her since yesterday,” Jack said coolly, feeling tense and volatile at the sound of Glassman’s voice.

  “She isn’t answering her phone,” Glassman said. “Look, why don’t you come down to the office and bring your lawyer. I’ve got a deal for you.”

  Jack would never accept a deal from Glassman, but he was in the game and he had to play it through. “My lawyer will be in touch with you to arrange a meeting—between him and your lawyer. I’m busy.”

  Glassman snorted. “Doing what, picking your nose?” He laughed and hung up.

  Jack called Brent Baron. Brent, his lawyer, had the letter incriminating Glassman with everything Jack knew, but Brent hadn’t read it and didn’t know anything about what was going on. He was under instructions to open the letter and take appropriate action in the event that Jack had a serious accident or died from other than natural causes.

  “I want you to find out what deal Glassman’s got cooking,” Jack said.

  “Isn’t this a job for Sanderson?”

  “No, Brent, it’s not.” Jack filled him in on some of the details.

  Baron told him he’d take care of it and get back to him. Jack hung up, then on impulse dialed her number. Her answering machine came on. “Hi, this is Belinda. I’m not in right now, but I’ll get back to you when I can.” Beep.

  Jack hesitated, then hung up. They had to talk. After all, they were married. Didn’t that give him some rights? Or had he forfeited those by using her so callously? He knew he should wait a few days to let her cool down, but he was impatient and recognized it. He drove over.

  Hoping she was home.

  Heart thudding wildly.

  Jesus, I’m a wreck, he thought, his hands white on the steering wheel.

  He knew as he approached the front door that nobody was there. He knew it. But he rang anyway, after walking around the perimeter of the beach house, peering in windows. No, nobody was home. He decided to wait.

  He waited two hours and finally left, wondering where the hell she was.

  He came back that evening. She still wasn’t there.

  He wanted to know where she was. Jack prowled around the house again until he found an unlocked window, and he slid it open and entered. He would wait all fucking night—but they were going to talk.

  118

  Adam was not in the best of moods.

  He had been calling Belinda all week. Either she wasn’t answering the phone or she was still out of town, and if it was the latter, she couldn’t possibly be with Ford, could she? It seemed more than possible, and he was consumed with fury.

  He had told his secretary to hold all calls. He tried Belinda yet again, with the same results. Maybe he would go over there to see for himself if she was actually back or not. His secretary buzzed. “What is it, Anne?”

  “Mr. Gordon, it’s Abe Glassman. He says it’s urgent.”

  “I told you to hold all calls,” Adam grated, hating having to kowtow to the inevitable—and the inevitable was Abe Glassman.

  “I told him you’d just stepped away from your desk. I’ll take a message—”

  “Put him through,” Adam snapped. A moment later he regretted it. Thoroughly.

  “Are you a loser or a winner, boy?” Abe shouted with no preliminaries. He didn’t pause for the answer. “I pegged you for a winner, Adam, but maybe I was wrong. Have you heard the news?”

  Hatred and dread alternated. “What news?”

  “My daughter and Jack Ford.”

  The dread grew.

  “That daughter of mine married Jack Ford.”

  Shock.

  “You there? I thought you had her where she belonged—in your bed, making my heir. She obviously wasn’t there. What in hell happened?”

  Belinda and Ford. He was remembering Majoriis’s party and how they’d come on to each other for the whole world to see. He was remembering Aspen—how she’d dumped him to leave with Ford. He thought about the two weeks that they were on location in Tucson together—had they been fucking back then? Playing him, Adam, for a fool?

  “Well, the game ain’t over yet,” Abe said nastily. “I’m going to destroy that little prick—you can count on that. And when I do, Adam, you’d better be there, waiting to pick up the pieces. You got that?”

  Oh, he had it, all right. “Yes.”

  Glassman hung up.

  Adam stared at the phone. Then he slammed the receiver as hard as he could on the cradle, cracking it. Just who did that cunt think she was? To make a fool of him? To reject him again? To destroy his chance at Glassman’s empire?

  Rage, red-hot.

  Hatred.

  It was hard to think; all Adam could do was feel. But he forced himself to control the burning need to destroy.

  And he began to plot his revenge.

  119

  “I think she’s in Tahoe,” Peter Lansing said.

  Jack was feeling crazed. She hadn’t come home that night. And he knew beyond a doubt she was with another guy, to get back at him. Even now, three days later, he was filled with anger and jealousy. “You ha
ven’t found her?”

  “I’m going to go up there and start looking. She took her Jeep and her dog. From what I found out, that’s a typical Tahoe pattern for her. She also took her skis.”

  “I’m coming with you,” Jack said quickly.

  “It could still be a few days,” Lansing told him.

  “I’m coming,” Jack said stubbornly. “After all, she’s my wife.”

  Lansing shrugged.

  It had been four days since he had gone to Glassman, since she had told him she hated him. Four endless, endless days. He couldn’t sleep, couldn’t function. He was obsessed. He had to find her, had to explain. Had to make things right. He would, too, by sheer force of will. She couldn’t resist him, not this time. And he prayed that, for once, his charm wouldn’t fail.

  On the flight up to Tahoe he thought about Glassman’s deal—with no regret for refusing. Glassman had offered to release him from the North-Star contract in exchange for a Reno divorce. Baron had not asked any questions, but Jack could see that he wanted to ask a dozen. Jack had curtly told him to refuse. Baron had.

  It hadn’t even been tempting.

  He had told Baron he was breaking his contract with North-Star.

  Yes, he knew he would be sued, but it was time to bare all. Time to come up head-to-head against that sociopathic bastard and fight to the death. His career was over, as it now was—so what did he have to lose? The answer was easy. Belinda.

  If he hadn’t lost her already.

  He knew she didn’t seem to love or even like her father, but he was afraid of how she would react to this development on top of everything else: an open battle with her father. North-Star would sue him and win, Baron said; but when everything came out, the settlement might not be too bad. The settlement, however, was one thing; whether another studio would touch him was another.

  Sanderson had had a stroke of genius. “We’ll turn it around, Jack,” he said.

  He hadn’t understood.

  “The PR. You’re the goddamn victim here—and the public loves an underdog. Maybe, with luck—lots of luck and even more careful planning—when all this is over you’ll be hot. Hot! Jack Ford, poor boy trying to make it big, getting trounced on by a near-mafioso again and again—Jesus, Jack, once he nearly had you killed!” His eyes were snapping in excitement.